1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a droplet discharge amount measuring method for measuring the amount of droplets of a functional solution discharged from a droplet discharge apparatus and an organic electroluminescence (EL) manufacturing method based on this droplet discharge amount measuring method.
2. Related Art
Organic EL apparatuses can be manufactured by several existing methods, for example, a method in which a functional solution is discharged from a droplet discharge apparatus, and then the functional solution is dried to form a luminescent layer retaining organic EL devices. However, the amount of functional solution discharged from the droplet discharge apparatus varies depending on the characteristics of pressure-generating devices used and the status of nozzle openings. To overcome this inconvenience, JP-A-2005-121401 has proposed a method in which droplets of a functional solution are discharged from a droplet discharge apparatus onto a test surface, the volume of the droplets that land on the test surface is measured, and then the volume measurement is used to adjust the droplet discharge amount.
However, as shown in FIG. 5, droplets M that land on a test surface 11 gradually loses their volume as the solvent thereof evaporates. In the method described in JP-A-2005-121401, there is a time lag between the landing of the droplets and measurement, and thus the accurate volume of the droplets on landing cannot be measured.